MBABANE, 23 Nov 2006 (IRIN) - Swazi health authorities have issued a warning against eating frogs in response to reported incidents of poisoning, as hungry Swazis, breaking taboos, have turned to catching the creatures."November/December is the lean 'time of want,' before the summer crops begin bearing food and after last year's stockpiles have been exhausted. But the eating of frogs is new, and shows the desperation of some people," said Christopher Dlamini of the Baphalali Swaziland Red Cross Society, as the organisation is known in the country.
Three young siblings from the drought-prone Shiselweni Region in the south were hospitalised for two weeks after consuming a stew made partly of frog flesh. The source of their food poisoning became known when their aunt, who prepared the dish, admitted to the children's mother she had supplemented the meagre meal with frog meat.
The local Taiwanese embassy has also issued a safety alert, and an embassy official told the local press that Swaziland had no frogs that were safe to eat.
Dr Austen Ezeogu, Senior Medical Officer at the Mbabane Government Hospital, in the capital, said in a statement released by the health ministry: "Frogs, other than the species found in the sea, are poisonous and must not be eaten."
Reports of frog consumption are largely anecdotal, but officials fear they may be linked to ongoing food shortages. Some 69 percent of the Swazi population lives at or below the poverty line of less than US$1 a day.
"What I find remarkable is that the eating of frogs is breaking taboo," said Amanda Dlamini, a schoolteacher who distributes food aid in the central Manzini region.
Traditionally Swazis do not eat amphibians, and usually disdain fish or other waterborne creatures found in rivers, lakes or imported from the ocean.
World Vision, an NGO involved in food distribution, cautioned against linking the one instance of frog poisoning to widespread consumption of frogs by Swazis, but health officials want to ensure the incident is not repeated.
About one-quarter of the million-strong population is receiving food assistance of some sort. Drought and AIDS have decimated the country's agricultural workforce, cutting into food production. Swaziland has the world's highest national HIV/AIDS prevalence rate, reaching 42.6 percent among pregnant women attending antenatal care centres.
Chronic drought has made marginal land unproductive, forcing tens of thousands of families who survive on subsistence farming in the southern Shiselweni and eastern Lubombo regions to depend on international food aid. According to preliminary information released to the Southern African Development Community by the national Vulnerability Assessment Committee, Swaziland produced about 81,000mt of cereal in 2006, compared to the country's consumption requirement of 195,000mt.
The United Nations World Food Programme plans to provide food aid to about 200,000 people through to December 2006.
Reproduced with the kind permission of IRIN
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